What is Love
by aero-breaking
Summary: Herein lies Jean's love life. (Or the case in which Jean is in denial and won't admit the truth the whole damn world sees.) As seen through the eyes of his best friend. "Come off it Jean. I don't think you realize how head-over-heals in love with her you are. It's really sick. I feel like I'm watching a teenage drama unfold before me." jeansasha. companion piece to Play My Ace.


**note one: **i just wanted to make something light and fluffy. to distract myself from the pain (and utter frustration) that another project is bringing me. /whispers/ _drag me from heaven's gate. _if you haven't read it please do. (excuse the shameless self-promotion)

**note two: **this is a companion piece to **_Play My Ace_**. to understand this, i think i'd be better to read that one first, if you haven't already. i just wanted to write something, _anything_, to get rid of this…urge. also, i think eren and jean are just tsundere best friends. they're just…so much a like and at the same time total opposites. they're cute to write. they're the type of people that talk with their fists. or something.

**note three: **jeansasha is life. and rainbows. and everything that matters in the world.

* * *

**WHAT IS LOVE**

_aero-breaking_

* * *

Eren has had the displeasure of knowing Jean since they were ten years old. The first time they met they argued over something, he really can't remember what it was anymore, and fought until they were both covered with scrapes and bruises. Armin had been crying in the background but neither of them relented until Mikasa came running around the playground and drop kicked them both.

This general dislike went on until middle school, when Eren's mother died. The following months after the funeral Eren was unapproachable, the only one stupid enough to talk to him had been Jean. They had gotten into a pretty bad fight once and Eren took out all his frustration and anger out on him. But it wasn't like Jean took his punches laying down. The asshole had fought back and broken three of his fingers. It had been a fair-and-square match.

Eren doesn't understand how they became friends after that, really he doesn't. It was just something that happened.

Kind of like the way Jean totally fell in love with Sasha after high school. It just happened. Jean is too stupid to realize it, but Eren—and the rest of the damn world—sees it for what it is. (And they tell _him _he can't read the atmosphere) His friend had been in so deep, that it had been hard not to make fun of him. And the only reason he didn't was because Mikasa had threatened him with bodily harm. She was such a stick in the mud sometimes.

Sasha likes him back too. (This he learns after he had overheard her talking with Mikasa in one of their bimonthly sleepovers.) He goes to Armin to place bets.

* * *

**year: 860**

"So, I heard you got a girlfriend."

"What's it to you Yeager?"

"Nothing. Just y'know, inquiring."

Jean lifts his gaze from the anatomy book he's reading and squints at him, "_Inquiring_? Since when do _you _use that word? Last time I checked you still had the vocabulary of a ten year old."

"Screw you, Jean. I hope you choke and die."

"My sentiments are exactly the same."

A beat of silence goes by, "So…what about Sasha?"

This time Jean puts the book down and looks at Eren, who's trying to look nonchalant but totally failing. Holding a comic upside down is very inconspicuous. "What about her?"

"I dunno man, I thought you and her were like…dating, or something?"

Jean makes a face, "What? Absolutely not. I'd be broke within a month."

Eren doesn't say anything else, after realizing that what he was supposed to be reading made absolutely no sense.

* * *

**year: 861**

Eren knows Jean hates—detests, loathes—autumn. Everyone who'd had the misfortune to knowing him knew this fact. So with this knowledge he calls him up to pass on Sasha's message. Ha! The asshole deserved it.

Jean responds as expected. Totally pissed off and ready to get wasted.

So, they go out drinking that night, and Jean spills out his feelings. (He throws them up actually, but Eren refuses to acknowledge that part.)

"I-I just…I don't know what to do. I mean, she's so pretty." See, here was the thing with Jean, he was an honest drunk, and he didn't slur. This made it more convenient for Eren, because he was recording the idiot on his phone. This would serve as perfect blackmail. "I just-it won't work with anyone else. Why does-I mean-I compare all my girlfriends to her. And I-wait. I can't be saying this. She's my friend."

Jean grabs Eren by the collar of his shirt, "I CAN'T!" He begins shaking him and Eren is about to punch the living daylights out of him when Jean halts completely, looks down, and empties his stomach right on Eren's new shoes. And this is the part were Eren's memory cuts off, because he might have or might not have punched and thrown the bastard into a trashcan. And then proceeded to leave him there for two hours.

Eren leaves the bar that night with an unconscious Jean Kirschtein riding on the back of his pickup truck. Oh, and it had been raining.

* * *

**year: 862**

Eren is still rubbing his stomach when they make it to the steakhouse. Damn Mikasa and her freakishly strong girly arms. He sits as far way from her as possible. He had forgotten, for a fraction of a millisecond, that Mikasa did not take insults to Sasha well.

Something about them being best friend or something. And what a difference between male and female friendships, because he's lost count of how many times he's urged other people to insult Jean. He himself insulted Jean on a regular basis (and Armin too, but don't tell Mikasa that or she will _castrate_ him).

It's actually really painful to watch Jean in the mist of Sasha showing off her boyfriend to everyone. He actually looks heartbroken. It almost makes Eren feel sorry for him.

But he doesn't do, or say, anything.

Instead he leans over to Armin, "So, is the bet still standing?"

Armin looks discretely form Sasha's overly happy face to Jean angrily poking his mashed potatoes. "Lets raise it to thiry-five."

"Sure thing man."

* * *

**year: 863**

"I heard Alastair and Sasha are done."

Eren doesn't think Jean notices the way his lips quirk into a smile. "They sure are."

"So are you finally going to make a move?"

Jean turns to him with a confused look on his face. "A move? On Sasha? What are you smoking?"

Eren takes in a deep breath. "You're dumber than I thought. I can't believe I'm associated with you."

"What the hell are you even talking about?"

Eren looks up at the sky, as if that would give him an answer. "I hope you get struck by lightning." He stands up and walks away.

Leaving Jean to stare confusedly after him.

* * *

**year: 864**

"So I heard you comforted Sasha in the rain."

"Again? Why are you so set on Sasha and me getting together?"

Armin shoots him a glare from across the table, he'd lost the bet already. He had said they'd get together by last year, while Eren, understanding Jean's incapability to understand his own feelings, had betted on the year 855. It was quickly approaching and this roach did not _make a damn move_. It's not like he needed those fifty dollars, Armin and him had raised the amount, _yet again_, but he wanted to, just once, beat Armin at something that wasn't strength related.

And obviously their mutual friend's love life was the way to go.

"Come off it Jean. I don't think you realize how head-over-heals in love with her you are. It's really sick. I feel like I'm watching a teenage drama unfold before me."

"You're delusional."

Armin lets out a long sigh, "Eren's right Jean."

Jean looks at the blond incredulously, "Not you too. Please. I have enough with this over-grown gorilla at my back every week."

"Who's a gorilla, horseface?" Eren is promptly ignored.

"I'm sorry Jean. It's just that…your mom is already planning the wedding."

"WHAT?!"

"You didn't know?" Armin is left talking to no one as Jean races out of Eren's apartment. Shouting something along the lines of, "The woman has finally lost it!"

Eren sighs and leans back on his chair. "He'll come around eventually. I'm gonna win this even if it kills me."

* * *

**year: 865**

"So," Eren beings, his voice laced with sleep and looking at Jean's terrified face. "You finally realized it." They're standing right outside his apartment, Jean had come banging on his door as if he were dying. Eren had been sleeping. Neither of them is in their right mind. It's the middle of the night and all Eren wants to do is grind Jean's face into the pavement. _Damn it, Jean. This is not the fucking time._

"WHAT DO I DO?"

"Here's what you do, asshole." Eren begins, slinging an arm around Jean's shoulders. He almost stumbles because he's just so tired, it had been a long day at the office today. But he continues after he's steadied himself. "First, you walk right back out this door and get me two twenty-four packs of beer, or some vodka, either is fine. It's too late to be dealing with your crisis in a sober state. Bring chocolate too. And maybe some chips. Or burgers. Secondly, when you come back, and you'd better, we'll talk this through and we'll call Armin. We can do the whole nine yards of late night gossiping as if we were a bunch of fifteen-year-old girls. Okay?"

Eren can't believe it, but they actually do spend the rest of the night gossiping like fifteen-year-old girls. The things he does for his friends. But of course, like the incompetent men they are when it comes to matters of the heart, they don't reach a conclusion. Or help in anything really. They just drink vodka and beer and eat all the food that was available within arms reach and let Jean pour out his heart.

The good thing of all this is that it's Saturday and none of them work the next day. They get so wasted that in the morning, when Mikasa stands over him holding a cooking pan on her hand, everything almost makes sense. Because Eren is, from what his friends had told him, an offensive drunk. He also has a tendency to break things, which is why Mikasa had prohibited him from drinking in the apartment.

"I'm so sorry." He whispers. The light is so loud. "I did it for a friend."

She has no mercy.

But in return, she advises Jean.

Eren thinks it's all worth it when he sees Jean and Sasha finally dating a week later. It was _about _time. Oh, and the fifty dollars Armin had slapped into his hands had been good for something. He bought Mikasa a dress. To apologize. And to get her to tend to his bruises.

* * *

**year: 866**

It's really, _really _weird, and unexpected, when Jean asks him to be his best man. Eren doesn't know what to say. No, wait. Yes he does.

So he then proceeds to embarrass Jean in his best man speech a few months later. Everything from the pranks that went totally wrong, to the fights, to that one spring break nobody like to talk about, to Jean's lovesickness, and even all the way back to when they first met and Eren totally wiped the floor with him. He tells it all.

He also talks about Sasha, because hell, he's known her since high school and she could still beat him in a race and an eating contest any day of the week. He respects her for that.

They're his friends, and it's really weird to see them get married, and commitment seems like a really big deal, and they're a really strange pair. But Eren knows they'll do just fine.

Besides the totally expensive vodka they had at the reception was totally worth it.

* * *

**note four: **umm, ta-dah? so…what did you guys think? uh, there's not much jeansasha as there is jean and eren friendship. but i hope you guys like it.

**please review and favorite.**


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